Platini: UEFA is doing everything in its power to eradicate racism from the sport

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By Tom Maston

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Oct 23, 2012 12:49:00 PM

The president of the European governing body believes it will do all it can to perform a full investigation into the abuse suffered by the English Under-21 players in Serbia.

Michel Platini has backed UEFA to continue its fight against racism after disciplinary proceedings were opened against the Serbian FA following the reports of abusive shouts aimed towards England's Under-21 players in Krusevac.

The president of the European governing body has backed the organization's disciplinary committee to investigate the matter thoroughly and hand out the necessary punishment to anyone charged with racial abuse.

"Concerning the U-21 game between Serbia and England, we will receive the report from the delegates, the report from the officials and from the people who were there," Platini said at a press conference. "We have television images. The disciplinary committee will deal with it."

Platini also revealed that he received a letter from British Sports Minister Hugh Robertson asking for tough sanctions against the Serbian FA.

"The Sports Minister asked me to do something," Platini said. "I answered him as I've just said, which is that we are fighting racism. We are doing a lot of things. The disciplinary committee will decide."

UEFA has been criticized in recent years for not punishing those who have been found guilty of racism with big enough sanctions, but the former France international believes that the organization is doing all it can to combat the issue.

"We have a lot of associations that we finance and that we help to fight racism. It's not an easy issue, but we are doing everything in our power to eradicate racism in our stadiums," Platini said. "We often have important cases in quite a few countries. We try and fight against that. It's a real fight that we've been leading for many years."

Platini did explain that UEFA has watched some countries more closely than others, and that Serbia's history with racism could count against the nation in the current investigation.

"More than a year ago we gave a serious yellow card to Croatia and to Serbia, and we will see what the disciplinary committee decides," Platini said. "But it's true that it's a problem that concerns us enormously. It's difficult to remove all of that from the stadiums. It's not easy, but we're doing what we can."